Welcome to the Team
by Tattered-Petals
Summary: Nobody knew if it was because of his Father, or because of his Mother, or because of a life of injustice, that a good man like Spencer Reid would become a killer. AU with the team as serial killers.


**WARNING: Just want to warn everyone that there is some graphic descriptions of violence in this (nothing TOO bad), along with mentions of sexual assault (not detailed), and MINOR character death. **

The thick, warm, sticky substance coated his pale long fingers. It dripped to the floor unhurriedly, as though his entire life had turned slow-motion. It seemed almost more like a scene from a movie to him. Like something that couldn't possibly be real life. It was hard for him to believe that there was a dead man on the ground before him, throat slit and still oozing blood onto the cool concrete ground. There was a knife dropped beside him, coated in the sticky substance that also covered his fingertips. It couldn't be real life. He wasn't that person. The hands he was staring at could not possibly be his own.

The clapping he heard wasn't enough to break him out of his trance. He continued to stare at his fingers. He felt an odd pressure on his chest. It hurt. It thumped against it so hard, like there was something trapped in there desperately trying to remove itself from his body. Maybe it was his soul. Was he a bad person now? He'd felt like a bad person. Did the deed he just committed erase every good one he'd ever done? Would the nights he spent up comforting friends, the hours he spent as he tried to soothe his Mother, the whole life he lived before, would it all just fade away? Become some origin story about the life of a killer? Did he turn into the person that parents warned their children about?

Another warm liquid leaked down his face, dripped to the ground and mingled with the sticky substance that rest at his feet. But he knew they weren't the same, for the liquid that trailed down his cheeks were tears. It seemed so odd. He was a murderer. Why did he still have to feel? Why couldn't he be the cold and calculated killers he'd always read about? Why did his heart have to fight to remove itself from him? Why couldn't he go back in time? Do things differently? Why couldn't he go back in time? He didn't mean to! He didn't mean to!

SMACK!

He whimpered at the sting he felt on his cheek. The tears momentarily stopped falling and simply burned his eyes, but the shock of it all let the sob that was caught in his throat tumble out. It sounded broken, deranged, like it couldn't possibly come from himself.

"Was that really necessary?" One voice asked. It wasn't particularly caring.

"He was in shock," another voice explained calmly. It was then he felt two large hands grasp his shoulders. They shook him, as though to wake him from a terrible dream. He wished the whole scene was just that, a terrible dream. "Kid, you gotta snap out of it."

"D-Didn't...I didn't.." Another whimper tore itself from his throat, and his knees felt weak. He felt as though he'd clatter to the ground at any minute, fall into the mess he'd created.

"You did what you had to do," the voice assured him, comforting, but ultimately indifferent. "Can't change it now, kid. Can only go on."

"Reid," another voice, firmer and more authoritative, barked at him. He flinched. He always flinched when that tone was taken with him. "What is done is done. Now, Morgan will take you back. We'll finish this."

"The average human has 5.5 liters of blood in their body," he informed them all morbidly. He gazed at the red sticky mess on the floor. Tears still dribbled down his cheeks, and air still struggled to get to his lungs.

"Informative," the voice in front of him said dryly. "Now, come on, pretty boy. Let's go to your new home."

~.~.~.~.~.~.~.

Spencer Reid used to be a good man. At least, that was the story that the masses were told. He was born into an unfortunate world. Diana Reid, his Mother, was a paranoid schizophrenic whose condition worsened by the day. William Reid, his Father, had enough of his family when Spencer was only around ten years old, and walked out on them. Spencer was left to take care of his ill Mother, whose condition would sometimes grow so bad, she would forget her own son even existed.

There was one gift that Spencer Reid had, though, they were told. The gift of grand intelligence. The boy had an eidetic memory, an IQ of 187, and could read 20,000 words per-minute. Some felt he could have been a gift bestowed unto this world. A boy that when he grew, he could make all the difference. Change the world. Help those who needed to be helped. But alas, he failed to do any of that.

Spencer Reid was bullied terribly in school. Later stories were reported that on one occasion, the boy was even stripped naked and tied to a goal post, left to rot there cold, humiliated, and alone. None knew what time it was when he was freed, or if he'd had to even free himself.

Diana Reid's condition grew tragically worse, but no matter what, Spencer refused to admit her. He stayed close to home, passed brilliant opportunities, just to care for his Mother. Many wondered, as they listened to the story, how it could be possible that this was the same man they'd all heard about. How it was possible that Spencer Reid did what he did, when he used to be a sweet young man who put his Mother's care above his own?

But suddenly, one night, it seemed that Spencer's whole world tumbled down onto him...for Diana Reid hung herself. The simple explanation seemed to be that it all grew to be too much, that Spencer's love and care, the doctors he used every last cent to afford, the house which he kept in pristine condition, wasn't enough. Her own internal pain, the hallucinations she suffered so terribly, the constant paranoia she felt, it all grew too much for any human to take. So she'd ended it.

Alas, it seemed that the explanation wasn't enough for Spencer. He cried foul play. Claimed that when he'd awoken that night and saw his Mother, he'd also witnessed someone run out of the house. Claimed he'd been in too much of a state of shock to race after him, but deeply wished that he had. For no one believed the young man.

Spencer continued to throw his accusations, and eventually even pointed a finger at his Father. As it turned out, Diana Reid had been pestering William. She'd demanded he come back and make peace with their son, wrote him letters saying how he'd never paid the child support through Spencer's youth, how he abandoned them and owed it to her to at least pay some of her more costly medical bills, said how poor Spencer couldn't handle everything himself. She pestered him, and pestered him, she even threatened to take him to court for all his years of unpaid child support. The amount of money he owed them would have left him a broke man.

Spencer claimed William Reid must have hired someone to take out his Mother, but no one believed a word that had exited his lips. William Reid might have made some mistakes, but he was a good man. Years later, some wondered if Spencer had been right, but the allegations hadn't seemed to matter anymore, especially because of what had happened next.

Spencer had shown up at William's house. He'd screamed, and yelled, thrown a fist. He'd been arrested that day, and taken to jail. But that wasn't the end of Spencer Reid's tragic life story. Oh no, it wasn't even close. For Spencer hadn't rotted in jail, he'd faced the worst penance he could have imagined. He was admitted into a psychiatric facility. The psychiatrist he'd seen claimed that Spencer was having hallucinations, and was suffering a psychotic break. After all, he did have an elevated chance of developing schizophrenia. The psychiatrist claimed she felt Spencer Reid was a danger to himself, and those around him; that his own delusions were what led him to William Reid's house that day. William Reid, himself, had claimed that Spencer's rambling was incoherent, and that he had trouble following what on earth his son was saying.

In the future, the declaration of Spencer's mental instability was hotly debated. Most notably because of the fact that the psychiatrist was a good friend, turned lover, of William Reid's.

Some might have thought that would be that. That Spencer Reid lived out the rest of his days in a mental hospital while William Reid lived a happy life with his lover. That the tragedy of Spencer Reid's life story was perhaps over and done with. Only, it wasn't. For something that no one could have ever foreseen happened next.

William Reid was murdered. Bloody, disfigured, with not a trace of evidence left on him. Spencer had still been institutionalized when the crime had occurred, so he couldn't be implicated. The thing that had struck everyone as odd, was despite all that Spencer had claimed his Father had done, when the word came of his death, Spencer still cried.

Most were confused by this point of the story. Who on earth had killed William Reid? Spencer was in an institution, his Mother was dead, any friends he'd once possessed had abandoned him, and his Father's psychiatrist lover was at work that evening. At this point of the story you can't possibly understand what was to happen next without the background of what had been happening elsewhere prior. For this story is not just the story of Spencer Reid, it's the story of a team of serial killers.

Now, at this point you lose a lot of people. First they were hearing of a story about a genius boy who had an unlucky go at life, now the topic moved to a team of serial killers? Now, the term serial killers should be used loosely. Some claimed them to be assassins, some said vigilantes, and then some paranoid individuals even claimed they were a secret part of the government. But one thing everyone always seemed to be able to agree on was that they were dangerous.

Nobody knew exactly how many members of the team there were. All they knew was that they possessed a collection of very smart, savvy, and dangerous people who knew the system. A lot of the details were kept hidden from the general public, but nothing truly stays hidden forever. The team wasn't exactly secretive about who joined them. Nor were they secret about taking responsibility for their kills. Their symbol was always carved behind the ear of their victims. But no matter the symbol carved, the way they were murdered, the people involved, or whatever evidence the FBI thought they'd found, they were never able to bring down the team.

Their kills seemed to be taken at random. There was no pattern to follow. No logic. Yet, it felt as though it were all perfectly planned. Their kills ranged all the way from a school teacher, to a mayor, to a Father, to a serial killer, to a rapist, to a child molester, and so forth. Sometimes there was hope that they'd found a motive behind the killings. There was something they were able to dig up from the victim's past, some horrible deed they'd done that perhaps had made them eligible for the kill. But others? Others just seemed to be law abiding citizens without even a parking ticket to their name.

They'd only been able to catch one member of the team, ever. Her name was Ashley Seaver, and she'd killed herself before she'd spoken a word to the authorities. There was no way to trace her back to where she'd been hiding out, to where the others were located. All they had was a dead girl, names, and a collection of bodies.

The known members of the team were Aaron Hotchner, a former DA who some said lost his way after the murder of his wife and son. Derek Morgan, a former police officer, who around the time of his departure from society left the body of the man who was later revealed to have molested him, and many other children, the symbol carved behind his ear. Elle Greenaway, a former FBI agent who some said murdered a man in cold blood before resigning. Emily Prentiss, the daughter of an ambassador. Very little was known about what had caused her to join the team, but the body of a IRA terrorist-turned-serial killer Ian Doyle was left in her wake. Penelope Garcia, a brilliant computer hacker known as the Black Queen, who some felt had lost her way, and her judgement, after the death of her parents; though many say Penelope never seemed to commit murder. Jennifer Jareau, much like Aaron Hotchner, suffered the loss of her husband and son, not to mention her unborn child, and was left alive, but sexually assaulted; the supposed killer was found brutalized, with the symbol carved jaggedly behind his ear.

They always knew when a new member joined the team. Well, they always knew when the team wanted them to know. The symbol they carved behind the ear was a jagged symbol of karma. It often switched. Different symbols for each kill, to show no religious preference. Religion meant nothing to them. It wasn't about pleasing their God, or Gods, it was simply about karma.

Now, at this part of the story you've lost even more people. Some have lost interest, some are more confused, and others ask the next question; "How do you know when someone else joins?".

There were many different ways, authorities assumed. The kill usually related to the person taken. But there was a sure fire away. Because there was always a note left behind. Never was it written by the person, and it always said the same thing. A quote.

"If you look too long into the Abyss, the Abyss looks into you". A quote by Frederick Nietzche.

No one exactly knew why the quote was used, or what its meaning due to the situations were. But it was there. Every time. Without fail.

The day Spencer Reid disappeared from the hospital, the quote was left in his empty bed. There was no mess. No sign of a struggle. No one had seen him leave. Nothing. He was just gone, with only the note, and the body of his Father left in his wake.

That was, until about a week later. When the body of another man popped up. Later research done by the FBI revealed him to be a hit man, and even more speculation was drawn to the fact that perhaps Spencer Reid wasn't insane. Perhaps he was just a young man, constantly wronged throughout his life, left vulnerable to the taking.

But the day the note was found, even the most experienced FBI agents felt a shiver run down their spines, and felt their hands grow clammy, and their mouths go dry. For then, a team of untraceable killers had brought a genius to their flock.

The opinions of Spencer Reid differed by person. Some pitied him, others felt hatred towards him, and then some were plainly indifferent. But the problem with the story just told was the fact that people interpret everything they read a different way. Some people read the story and read about a man who killed his Mother in a psychotic break, and showed up at his Father's house that day to do similar to him. Others thought that Spencer Reid was insane, and was driven into a break after the death of his Mother. Others thought that Spencer Reid was a victim of abandonment, a victim of bad circumstance, a constant victim up until the day he became the perpetrator.

But no one's opinion quite mattered. Spencer Reid was never caught. His side of the story? Never told.

The authorities never found out who ran the team, and it was a question that ate away at them all until the day they died.

~.~.~.~.~.~.

Derek Morgan had since taken Spencer out of the car they used for transport, and put a hand on his back as he guided him to their home-base. Spencer shook underneath the warm hand, his own still coated in the thick gooey substance. Part of him had wondered if he'd felt good after the kill, if he'd feel like justice had been served. He hadn't. He'd felt cold, empty, like part of him had died on the floor along with the other man. He was a monster.

The loud noise of Derek's fist colliding with the door sent a shock through his body, and he'd let out a small yelp. Derek had snorted, he must have looked quite amusing to the older man. "Relax," Derek soothed. "It'll all be okay."

"Morgan," a voice greeted as the door was opened, and the gate that shielded the door was unlocked, and opened up. The kind face of Alex Blake greeted them both. She was one of the "unknown". Derek said that's what they called the ones that the government didn't know about, would never know about. Spencer hadn't a clue about what Alex did...or had done...but she'd treated him kindly. "Spencer." Her eyes drifted down to his outstretched hands. She smiled slightly. "I see you've completed your first."

"Prentiss and Hotch are...completing the process," Derek explained. Alex stepped out of the way and welcomed them both inside. Spencer only walked with Derek's prompting. "The kid was a little freaked out."

"We all were," Alex said pleasantly, she closed the gate and then shut the door. "I'll wait here for them. You should take Spencer to see him, I'm sure he'll be overjoyed." Alex was one of the few who actually called him by his first name. It had sent a type of comfort to his stomach at first, but his stomach could not be settled that day.

"Yep, I'll bring him there now," Derek said, and sent a grin to Alex as he guided Spencer's shivering form through the halls. "You'll be okay," he whispered to him. "He likes you."

"I-I-my hands!" Spencer cried out brokenly.

Derek snorted. "He's seen worse."

Spencer had been guided all the way to Penelope's tech room, where he stood next to her, he gazed over her shoulder contemplatively as she typed madly. Derek cleared his throat, and Penelope spun around in her swivel chair and gasped when she saw Spencer. But then, he turned around, and time felt as though it stood still. He gazed up and down Spencer's form, his expression was originally unreadable. The perfect mask of indifference. But then, it all changed. A smile spread on his face, big and delighted.

"Spencer," Jason Gideon, their leader, greeted. "Welcome to the team."


End file.
